Christmas: Are they shoving it down our throats too early?

[cjd874]

One notable exception, at this time of year we get to see Terry's chocolate oranges. Orange-infused chocolate is a nice alternative to peppermint overkill.

It's nice the candy companies make candy canes in other fruity flavors besides peppermint. But I did a double take when I saw Crayola-brand candy canes. Yes, the crayon company has a line of candy canes.

Next thing you know Bic pens will make licorice.

I don't want to imagine how Crayola candy canes would taste. I fear that it might be like biting into a red-and-white striped crayon…

Here in NYC, holiday spirit is in full bloom. Macy's on 34th Street had a Christmas-related display BEFORE Thanksgiving, and I've been seeing trees, decorations, Christmas cards, cookies, etc. all over the place. Only 25 days left until it actually comes along...

 

[Drtooth]

It's nice the candy companies make candy canes in other fruity flavors besides peppermint. But I did a double take when I saw Crayola-brand candy canes. Yes, the crayon company has a line of candy canes.

So many kinds of licensed candy canes. Those are great. They have Hawaiian Punch ones, and I totally have to get those. But the one I'm very curious about are the Swedish Fish ones. Now those are either pretty good or freaking terrible. Or generic Cherry like ones.

Then they have the licensed character ones which are just standard assorted flavors with cartoons on the wrappers. They usually use the same cherry, sour apple, and blue raspberry ones.

But yeah. Too much mint this time of year. We need more Christmas flavors besides that one. We just came off of Pumpkin Spice overload, mint's kinda disappointing now.


Of course, there's always gingerbread, too. That doesn't get around as much as mint.

 

[fuzzygobo]

I'm not the hugest fan of peppermint either (can't stand those Starlite mints), but I love those After Eight dinner mints. Expensive as anything, but once a year, live a little.

 

[Drtooth]

Oh, I like mint and all. I just like a variety of flavors that you're only supposed to enjoy once a year. There are some very specific products I look forward to every holiday, and it's disappointing when one's discontinued. Yeah, I'm glad that Hostess was rescued (barring the fact the greedy little morons who ran it into the ground deserve to have been punished fiscally), but why no freakin' Scary Cakes!?! To be honest, there's really not that much for Christmas, oddly being the biggest thing of the year. Though I do appreciate the Easter candy they're trying to associate. Peeps shaped like trees, Cadbury eggs with the egg shape turned into random orbs. Easter, I could rattle a long list of products I always look forward to. I dunno if the re-purposed tree and orb shaped stuff makes the Easter stuff less special or what.

Now, changing the subject... am I the only one that thinks they can't make a decent Christmas special to save their lives anymore? The classics are classic for a reason, yet I almost have to watch every one of them every other year to prevent them from being too stale. It's as if the best Christmas cartoons I've seen in recent years are all twisted episodes of current shows. Invader Zim's was on Nicktoons last night, and it got me to thinking about these things. When they do serious one off Christmas specials now (though Disney did a great job with Prep and Landing), they're bland imitations of older specials. And some have to be movies?! That Elf on a Shelf one (which is getting an obnoxious spinoff) looks awful.

 

[mr3urious]

Now, changing the subject... am I the only one that thinks they can't make a decent Christmas special to save their lives anymore? The classics are classic for a reason, yet I almost have to watch every one of them every other year to prevent them from being too stale. It's as if the best Christmas cartoons I've seen in recent years are all twisted episodes of current shows. Invader Zim's was on Nicktoons last night, and it got me to thinking about these things. When they do serious one off Christmas specials now (though Disney did a great job with Prep and Landing), they're bland imitations of older specials. And some have to be movies?! That Elf on a Shelf one (which is getting an obnoxious spinoff) looks awful.

I'm looking forward to that Toy Story one tonight. I enjoyed the Halloween special, so this one looks promising.

 

[Drtooth]

I like how it's completely nontraditional a Christmas special. Seems the worst of the newer ones take an already overused trope and manage to make it even blander a cliche. No wonder I love twisted Christmas specials.

Also looking forward to Uncle Grandpa's Christmas special. Too bad CN blew the big reveal in the previews, though.

 

[WalterLinz]

I'm looking forward to that Toy Story one tonight. I enjoyed the Halloween special, so this one looks promising.

Me too. I had no idea it was gonna premiere today, it had got me even more excited about it! I also can't wait to meet all the new toys featured in the special:

Just...just...just yook at him!!!

 

[D'Snowth]

Did you make sure it was fastened correctly, or did you accidentally put the heavier ornaments on one side? Both tend to happen from time to time.

I think the tree itself was pretty much too unstable: it was really big, really heavy, had a crooked forked trunk, it was just too much.

 

[charlietheowl]

So did anybody watch the Toy Story special? I caught it and thought it was very good, and really liked the performance Kristen Schaal gave as Trixie. Perhaps it would be better for the franchise if they did a series of specials every so often instead of re-opening the movies after the third one closed things so well.

 

[Drtooth]

While definitely another topic for another thread, Pixar needs to be open to doing more half hour specials (with all their characters) than full on sequels. I have to admit, I dug what I've seen of the Cars based shorts. The general consensus is that Toy Story doesn't need a 4, and there's really no way to continue the series without it looking desperate... that is, unless we see more short stories and specials like this one. This special managed to accentuate what Toy Story is about without having to make a fourth movie. Why, they could very well have made this the fourth movie. They even had a nice little tie in to kids not playing with toys and going for electronic gizmos instead (something actually explored by a Sergio Aragonez comic in MAD). That could have been dragged out and bludgeoned to death in a film, where they went with something more subtle here.

And yes. It was great to see the special focus on a character that wasn't used or explored much. Trixie seemed pretty undefined a role, and this special greatly expanded on that. This really should be a lesson for Pixar, as there were a lot of interesting Monsters University characters that didn't have enough development due to the run time. I'd love to see the Terrys or Art get their own focused special or short in due time.